Anti-Globalists Pave the Way for Globalization

The First World War was largely borne out of a weak international order with strong military alliances. The Second World War was largely the failure to strengthen the international order after World War I. And the pattern continues, with refugees fleeing from crises that are caused in part by a weak order, and the migrations are made worse by not having a world community prepared to deal with displaced peoples at scale.

People like Donald Trump that believe we can shut our borders and ignore the world are missing the fact that doing so invites crises that will inevitably result in either the destruction of civilization (unlikely, but possible and therefore stupid in its own right) or a stronger international order.

Why is this the case? Because the pain caused by bad policies is eventually redressed by learning from the mistake and adding more controls against it. (As bad as MAD is, it’s better than world war. The unfortunate trade-off is a low likelihood of total annihilation for a high likelihood of avoiding world war.) We have plans in place to deal with domestic crises (even if they’re poorly implemented and subject to endless sabotage by politicians that deny reality). After the 2001 attacks, the USA stepped up its efforts on all fronts to avoid vulnerability to a similar or different attack. We tend to fail to fix problems until they’ve already happened, but once they’ve happened we at least make plausible efforts to prevent a recurrence. At least for awhile.

So the efforts by dictators and leader-fools to thwart a stronger international order will leave the door open to crisis, and crisis will provoke a stronger order. That will entail a diminished sovereignty and increased spending for preparedness, and in turn a higher tax rate, particularly on the wealthy libertarians that claim to have studied history and claim to know better.

The balance between big government and liberty is not solved by picking one. The synthesis is to enshrine rights at the highest tier of government and devolve the administration of government, within the boundaries of rights, to the lowest reasonable level.

(Take healthcare as an example. The main reason the federal government involves itself in healthcare is that some of the states have historically bungled it, attempted to deny it on the basis of race, etc. That failure and those like it, at the lower tiers, to respect and enshrine rights, drives the enlargement of the federal government, for good and ill.)

It is not a simple task, to find this new balance, but it is achievable. And with the complexity of the modern world, it becomes necessary. It requires proponents of small government to agree that it’s better to have these rights recognized while pushing functions down the chain (and privatizing where possible) rather than leaning on racism and gluttony to try to drive a wedge between the people and their rights.

Ten days. There is an election in ten days. Check with your state election authorities for details. You should have registered by now (unless you live in a state with same-day registration)—if you missed the deadline, go ahead and register for next time.